


Pre-War: The Calm Before The Storm and Lightning Strikes More Than Once, More Than Twice, Too Many Times

by Badassium1970



Series: Hunger Is Like Second Nature To Us [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Disordered Eating, Fluff, Ignoring timeline because I don't remember everything in canon and don't care to look it up, Kinda, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-30 07:50:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19848769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Badassium1970/pseuds/Badassium1970
Summary: Steve and his mother were poor, and then Steve's mother died and he blamed himself. Bucky was never going to sit back and watch his friend suffer. He wasn't going to let Steve suffer on his own.Both boys knew too well what hunger felt like.A look into Steve and Bucky's life and disordered eating.





	Pre-War: The Calm Before The Storm and Lightning Strikes More Than Once, More Than Twice, Too Many Times

**Author's Note:**

> Just want to give a heads up that this fic is focused on disordered eating rather than eating disorders but could be triggering to people who suffer from eating disorders especially anorexia.

Growing up Steve was a little too familiar with the concept of hunger.

His father, a drunk with a minor gambling addiction, had died when Steve was only six years old, and while the majority of his money was spent on cheap booze or betting, he also paid for his fair share of food. The Rogers family never had much going spare, especially not with a somewhat sickly child, but they had enough.

At first, Steve and his mother, Sarah, managed. The neighbours helped where they could but they lived in a poorer part of Brooklyn and soon help was no longer being offered. With Steve's developing sicknesses; too many to count before he had even hit his teens, Sarah was working as many shifts as possible to afford his medications and keep food on the table for them both. She was working herself to the bone to keep her son alive, but she would never regret it.

Steve was an observant child. He noticed things others his age probably wouldn't. His mother tried her best to hid their struggles when it came to money and food but Steve knew there were times when his mother wouldn't buy food for herself, and saw that she skipped meals. He never believed her when she said she had eaten at work; knew better than to believe her. Steve watched as his mother went down a dress size and watched as she sewed her clothes to fit her better. He could see that she was growing weaker, almost as weak as he was.

It hurt to watch so he decided to take action.

Slowly, so that his mother wouldn't notice, Steve began to eat less.

He started waking up earlier to make his mother breakfast before she went to work and he had to go to school. Steve himself would either not eat for cut himself the thinnest slice of bread imaginable. On the days where he didn't eat he would dirty up a plate to make it look like he had. Steve was smart, and while he felt guilty for it, he knew how to fool his mother and at the end of the day, it meant that she was eating. It didn't take much to convince himself that he was doing the right thing, even if some days the hunger pains were enough to make him want to pass out. Even if concentrating in school became more difficult and he was envious at lunch when the other children had food and he didn't. If he sometimes felt sick with hunger then he never mentioned it. He made sure not to mention when he knew he was ill now. At least not until it got to a point where others noticed his illness or he simply couldn't bear it anymore. However, he noticed that the less he ate the more often he got sick. Once that connection was made he upped his food intake slightly. Only the cheapest foods and things that went off quickest since the guilt of wasted food had begun to eat him alive now and haunt him. Medication cost more than food so it made sense to eat a little more, and he still waited as long as possible before he told his mother he was sick so that money could go towards food for as long as possible instead of being split for medicine as well.

While the hunger was never-ending he didn't care as long as his mother was okay. Sure the pain was constantly there but he grew used to it and he revelled in seeing the light return to his mother's eyes and the way her skin began to glow again. Watching her return to a healthy weight was worth the constant feeling of emptiness in his stomach.

Steve had always been small and had never been able to put on weight anyway, so no one noticed if he lost a few more pounds, especially since his many ailments caused him to vomit more often than not on bad days. His bones had always been prominent but his baggy clothing hid just how easily it was to count his ribs.

Steve didn't realise that he was slowly starving himself to death. He probably would have too, if it wasn't for Bucky.

Things got a little better when Bucky befriended Steve.

Bucky, aged fourteen, had seen the scrawny kid in the year below trying to take on a fifteen-year-old who was almost three times bigger than him and was getting his ass kicked. Luckily, Bucky had been taking some boxing lessons whenever he could and made sure the boy would never bother Steve again.

When he asked Steve what had happened the younger boy explained that he'd heard the bully calling a girl derogatory terms because she had turned him down.

Bucky instantly respected Steve but knew that the kid was going to get himself killed without someone by his side. He had a strong overprotected urge and quickly told Steve that they were friends, and to call him Bucky.

"Bucky?"

"Yeah, that's what all my friends call me Stevie."

If Steve's heart pounded faster at the nickname he blamed it on heart arrhythmia.

The pair were fast friends and quickly became inseparable with a friendship that seemed indestructible even from the beginning.

With Bucky's friendship came invites for lunch and dinner, as well as the occasional overnight stay meaning breakfast at the Barnes household. Sarah was often invited for dinners, and she and Bucky's mother got along almost as well as their sons did. It was clear that Bucky must have gotten his overprotective side from his mother because as soon as she saw Sarah's still slightly too thin frame her first instinct was to make sure to invite Sarah and her son over as much as possible so they could both return to healthy weights.

Bucky's family weren't wealthy by any means, and they were a family of four, Bucky, his parents and his little sister, meaning there were more mouths to feed. However, his father had a stable job and his mother took shifts at the local store as often as she could but she admitted to Sarah that she wanted to be a nurse, mainly due to her desire to help others and Sarah was quick to help that dream become a reality. The family was also helped by two sets of grandparents still living, and they would send money to the family bi-monthly. Bucky also worked at the docks whenever he was able to. He couldn't do a lot at fourteen and therefore didn't get paid much but he was promised good work and decent pay by sixteen at the earliest.

So Steve and Sarah were fed well by the Buchanans. Steve still ate a little as possible at home, less now that he was able to get a few good meals a week at Bucky's house, and tried his best to eat as little as possible when he was at the Buchanan's household as he didn't want to be a burden. They didn't let him, however, seeing how skinny he was and knowing how often he got sick, not to mention the lifelong illness' he had they never let him eat less than his mother and sometimes he ate more.

The feeling of being full was strange to Steve; now a foreign concept to him that left him feeling guilty.

Turns out there wasn't time to get used to feeling full anyway.

Within a year and a half, all but one of Bucky's grandparents had died. Bucky's father had been made redundant as the company he worked for could no longer afford to pay so many workers, especially not with the rumour of war on the way. While Bucky, freshly turned sixteen, was now able to do proper work on the docks the pay he had been promised left a lot to be desired.

Steve and Sarah were still invited to lunches and dinners but the invites came out less often and the food was a lot more sparse.

The situation in their own home hadn't improved either. Steve was gradually becoming more and more sick. His hearing on his left side was all but gone and breathing hurt. He was trying to get work but couldn't hold down a job due to illness and Sarah could only get so much medication on a discount. She'd stolen on a few occasions but couldn't risk doing it too many times. She needed her job, now more than ever. Bucky's mother was in training and helped where she could, but still, the family struggled.

Any weight that Steve had gained in the last year and a half was rapidly lost. Steve was used to it. Sarah was working so many hours she wasn't around enough to notice. No one really noticed when Steve had always been small anyway. If it weren't for his willingness to get beaten up all the time he'd probably go unnoticed altogether.

The only person who saw what was happening was Bucky.

Bucky refused to let Steve suffer. Now that his family was having their own struggles financially Bucky had a taste of what hunger was really like. He understood what Steve was dealing with, even if it was on a less drastic level. Steve wasn't just going through this a few times a month; it was daily. Bucky wasn't going to allow it, especially when he knew how self-sacrificial Steve was and it was clear Steve would rather die than admit he was in pain and suffering.

It started with slipping some of his food onto Steve's plate when they ate together. Then he'd occasionally give Steve half of his food during lunch at school, claiming that his parents had packed too much and he was full. However, that didn't last long since Bucky dropped out so that he could work full time.

He'd use some of his wages to buy Steve snacks, buying himself something smaller as well so Steve didn't complain as much or try and give Bucky some of the food that had been bought for him. Most of the time Steve would save some, claiming it was for later, but Bucky knew he was going to give the rest to Sarah. It didn't bother Bucky much since he knew that Sarah was also probably going through was Steve was.

Bucky found several other ways to get Steve to eat and after a while, Steve knew better than to argue.

Bucky started to feel hunger more often, but it wasn't so bad. As he left his teens and entered his twenties he had lost the extra weight he had been carrying. Not that he had ever been anything close to what people would call fat but he was a little chubby in the face and slightly around his middle. Now he had a leaner build with muscle from his work at the docks and taking up boxing again, which came in handy since Steve was picking fights now more than ever.

His new build was granting him favourable attention from the ladies too, which Bucky knew he was meant to want so he acted on their advances and ignored the fact that he didn't actually seem to care. It was rare for him to see them more than a few times anyway when they realised that he and Steve were a package deal. Again, Bucky couldn't find it in himself to care.

Things were fine. Bucky's hunger was never unbearable and Steve was as healthy as he could be and as safe as he was willing to be.

Then Sarah got sick.

More and more often the snacks Bucky bought for Steve went to Sarah and Bucky knew better than to comment on it or try to buy something else. Steve didn't like feeling pitied or like he was being given handouts, especially now he was an adult. Bucky mumbled under his breath about Steve not having anything to prove and commented on how stubborn he was but it changed nothing.

The medicine Steve needed was often traded for his mother's medication or food that went to her and Steve made sure to never let her know that he wasn't eating any of it.

Steve was working as hard as he could, as long as he could, at as many places as he could. He'd even let a few people's unsavoury comments go a few times but it never lasted. You could never take the fight out of Steve and he was never going to let bullying slide. Still, he did what he could and was working himself to the bone. Bucky tried to do what he could but in the end, he was just watching helplessly as his best friend began to fade away again and it hurt because he wanted so desperately to help.

Steve did everything he could to try and save his mother.

It wasn't enough.

Sarah died after seven months of battling her illness. The doctors said that nothing could have been done to save her, and if anything, Steve had helped give her a few more months than they thought she would have. It was a nice sentiment, and it was probably true, but Steve still blamed himself. He kept telling himself that if he had started restricting food sooner; if he'd waited out on getting medication longer, then his mother would have lived. That she probably wouldn't have gotten sick in the first place. 

Even though in the back of his mind Steve knew that he would have died if he had lived the way he was for longer he probably would have died Steve didn't care. He knew his mother deserved to live more than he did.

Bucky didn't let Steve dwell on those thoughts for too long. He wasn't willing to let Steve ride this out on his own.

"I'm with you 'til the end of the line," Bucky had told him, not thinking too hard about the fact that spending the rest of his life with Steve sounded more like what he wanted than getting married to some dame and having kids.

At first, Steve was reluctant, not wanting to be a burden once again, but Bucky assured him that he wouldn't be, and that, if anything, he needed to company too. His father was off fighting in the war and his mother, currently pregnant, and his sister had both fled to England where Bucky's grandmother lived. Bucky had remained in Brooklyn, claiming that he had enlisted in the army but that was a lie. He had stayed for Steve.

Steve who was getting into fights he could never win. Steve who was too skinny. Steve who was too self-sacrificial for his own good. Steve who kept enlisting in the army like he had a deathwish and kept getting rejected. Steve, who Bucky cared about more than anyone in the world but refused to think about what that really meant.

Things were good for a while. The pair had enough rations to keep them both fed and Bucky still didn't mind the slight hunger due to slipping part of his share of food into Steve's.

Steve still got fired every other week and picked fights with anything that moved but he also still got art commissions and Bucky had a stable job meaning they could afford the medication Steve needed. The heating went out more often than it was on so Steve and Bucky shared a bed the majority of the time and tried to ignore how comfortable it felt.

Things were okay. They were managing.

By now they should have both been used to the fact that things never stay that way for long. The calm before the storm was another concept they were far too familiar with.

Bucky got conscripted. He was going to be shipped overseas and be a member of the army. Steve put on a happy face for him, trying to ignore the waves of jealousy and the general feeling that life wasn't fair to him, and Bucky acted as if he wanted to fight for his country and that things were going to be fine.

He worked extra shifts and put money by for Steve to find after he had left. Bucky did everything he could to make sure that Steve would be okay and also tried to act normal. As if he wasn't terrified.

If he was being completely honest, Bucky wasn't as afraid of dying on the battlefield as he was of Steve dying. He could imagine coming home to a pile of bones because Steve didn't have anyone to care for him since everyone cared more about what he looked like and not how good of a person he was.

The day Bucky shipped out he was sick with fear and anxiety but he put on a brave face for Steve, holding back tears and praying to a God he wasn't so sure he believed in anymore for Steve to be okay.

It's debatable as to whether his prayers were answers, but someone else saw what Bucky saw in Steve and Steve found his way into the army.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm really excited about this story so let me know what you think! 
> 
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> Art: https://www.instagram.com/retro_roses/?hl=en
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> Marvel account: https://twitter.com/badassium1970


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